At the end of a very odd day (First Minister resigning out of the blue) it was a pleasure to retire to The Glad for a dose of ambient guitar-core (check genre dictionary, oh well…) from a seemingly unseen giant of the Glaswegian and Scottish music scene.
The audience, warmed up by the dj-ing sounds of Slow Club was seated at a collection of tables – and they maintained a respectful shush in the quieter opening sections.
For a good hour Calum twiddled, plucked, strummed and switched his way around his fairly unique looking array of devices, his signature pedal-steel slightly out of view just in front of the desk he was sitting at. The music, without percussion at first, channelled ‘Wish You Were Here’-era Pink Floyd mixed with the ambient techno washes of The Orb to very satisfying effect. Electronic percussion ramped up the tempo for a middle section but the latter stages, deploying some keyboard as well, were free of beats.
Calum is obviously very talented and is somewhat of an unsung hero in these parts, especially given the reception he received and the make-up of the audience (a number of quite well-kent faces from “the industry” in the fairly well-populated crowd).
As per usual, soundman extraordinaire Richey Dempsey provided a great mix, bringing out the various textures of the music. The release, entitled ‘Colour of Stars’, is available on Bandcamp.